OK cayugad, we kind of got off track with hunting stories in your "Powder Charges" thread, so I thought I'd start a new one with a copy of an e-mail I sent to my son after the opening of the 2005 ML season. Here 'tis:
"Hi Bud,
Saturday morning was the first day of muzzle loader season. Well, here's how it went.
Loggers were cutting timber about 150 yards to the rear of my stand. Two honking big pieces of machinery roaring and belching diesel smoke. Cracking limbs and knocking down trees like big yellowdrunken dinosaurs. Even with that, at seven o'clock a yearling doe and button buck came out of the woods at the far end of the food plot, walked up to the feeder about 60 yards from my stand - perfect muzzleloading distance - and started eating corn. You could tell they were nervous about the logging activity, but they really wanted that corn. I knew at least one big doe had to be with them.
Sure 'nuff, about ten minutes later a nice doe entered the far end of the food plot, about 125 yards out. Too far for my muzzle loader. She just stood at the edge of the woods, but I knew she would join the twins under the feeder sooner or later. After moving back and forth along the tree line for a good fifteen minutes, she finally started moving toward the feeder, but she really didn't like what going on in that direction. She stopped about 100 yards out and stomped her foot twice. The twins wheeled around, ran to her, and they all went into the woods never to be seen again. At nine o'clock I gave up and quit the stand. Nothing was going to come into the open with the amount of noise those cutters were making. I'd heard two shots during the morning. So much for the morning hunt.
We had seven hunters out that morning. Two killed mature does, one 107 lbs., the other 115 lbs. One guy saw seven deer and one had a rack, but he had a migraine attack going on and couldn't focus well enough to tell how many points it had. He didn't shoot because it might have had less than the club's 6-point minimum. One guy saw a couple of does that he passed on. The two new club members didn't see anything. We sat around during the middle of the day and had a beer or two while watching the successful hunters butcher their deer. Everybody chipped in money for steaks for an evening feed.
The loggers said they would be quitting for the day around three-thirty, so I got back on the stand at three o'clock and waited for everything to settle down. They shut down as scheduled and my feeder went off at four-fifteen. Two yearlings and two mature does showed up about four-thirty. They were all near the feeder, about sixty yards out. I put my sights on the biggest doe half a dozen times, but kept thinking about those steaks we were putting on the grill at sundown. Did I really want to be skinning a deer after dinner? Aw, what the heck - I passed on the shot. The loggers won't be working Sunday morning. I'll shoot one then. The steaks were pretty good. Didn't see anything Sunday!
Keep your powder dry,
Love
Paw "
__________________
My wife says I'm totally nuts, but I think I'm Semisane.
Things I've Learned: (1) It's not possible to please everyone, but quite easy to piss everyone off. (2) If you love animals as I do, then you're not a vegetarian. (3) There's no need to act stupid, even if you're very good at it. (4) If you eat right and exercise, don't smoke or drink, you're going to die anyway.
Rambling Stories
